Hybrid methods are very popular for solving problems from combinatorial optimization. In contrast, the theoretical understanding of the interplay of different optimization methods is rare. In this paper, we make a first ...

Hybrid methods are very popular for solving problems from combinatorial optimization. In contrast, the theoretical understanding of the interplay of different optimization methods is rare. In this paper, we make a first ...

The main aim of randomized search heuristics is to produce good approximations of optimal solutions within a small amount of time. In contrast to numerous experimental results, there are only a few theoretical explorations ...

Various methods have been defined to measure the hardness of a fitness function for evolutionary algorithms and other black-box heuristics. Examples include fitness landscape analysis, epistasis, fitness-distance correlations ...